The snow accumulated
in the street, outside the bar.
In a booth, a couple drunks
were tunelessly singing, as
the pretty young blond
tells the dark-haired soldier
she is pregnant.
He takes her hand, says
that's what life is all about,
so they finish their beers
and go off into the night,
arm-in-arm, smiling. Then
suddenly, it's 1996, the soldier
is long dead, the young blond
is dying. At fifty,
their white-haired son
thinks of them, watching his
own children, playing in the street. And as the fading
light glances off an
empty can, he finishes
his own beer, conscious of
the approaching night,
aware the snow is still
accumulating, and the wind, in
the dark, lunging from tree to tree,
sounds almost like a drunk,
on his way home, singing.
-- George Freek